Buffalo LinkStation 410 and LinkStation 420 Refresh

By Hubert Nguyen

[CES 2013] Buffalo is coming up with two interesting models that are part of the 2013 refresh of the LinkStation line of network-attached storage (NAS). Both models feature a significant increase in performance (in MB/s) which is mainly due to a new processor (CPU) and a lot more memory. The CPU went from a frequency of 600Mhz to one of 1.6GHz, and the memory went from 64MB (DDR2) to 256MB (DDR3). Both upgrade are important and the combined effect should be a faster NAS, not only for read/write speed, but also for overall responsiveness, which is not negligible when you are the administrator. Both NAS devices are marketed to home or small business users.

The LinkStation 410 ($229 2TB to $399 4TB) is a single drive NAS, while the LinkStation 420 ($289 2TB to $719 8TB) is a dual drive model. There’s also a LinkStation 421E ($149 enclosure) version which is the fastest dual-bay model at Buffalo which also features a USB 3.0 port in the front of the chassis.